Rambles about stuff I like.

A Ramble about goals and positive self-talk.

Ah, Saturday. A nice lazy sleep-in day. Of course, sleeping in for me meant getting up at 7:30, so it’s all relative.

Anyhoo, the problem with sleeping in is that it creates lazy habits. As I woke up this morning, I was thinking to myself, “Meh, I’m just going to fritter the day away playing video games and not work on my goals.” Luckily, I came to my senses and did my goals and will indeed be going to the gym to work off last nights dinner.

My point is that, when you’re setting goals for yourself, your brain will try and talk you out of your plans. You’ve got to be aware of this – and basically, just being aware of this phenomena will keep you prepared for when it happens. So when it’s early in the morning and your brain is saying, “You don’t need to go to the gym today! You can go tomorrow!” You can recognize this as the brain trying to talk you out of your plans, and in fact, this will make you even more sure that you must go to the gym.

When I do my goals for the day, I always write down inspirational sayings at the end of them. One of those sayings is always going to be, “I know my brain will try and talk my out of my plans. This is my brain trying to protect my ego, and I acknowledge what it’s trying to do, but will continue with my plans no matter what!” If you can repeat that saying to yourself everyday, then you’ll have many more productive days than non-productive days.

Another saying I like to repeat is, “I can achieve anything I set out to achieve.” This is all about getting in the right mindset to do things.

Often, if we don’t have a good sleep, or it’s cold and rainy outside, the day looks bleak. It’s easy to say, “I can’t go running, it’s raining outside.” or, “I can’t go work out, I’m too sore from yesterday.” But this is, again, the brain trying to convince you not to follow your plans.

If instead, you say, “I see that it’s raining out, but I know I can run a good 3 miles today!” Then it’s as simple as that, and you will go running. It’s all about stating what you can do, before you do it. Then you have the expectation that you will do the thing, and that expectation allows you to do it.

I forget who’s quote this is, but the saying that, “Whether you think you can do something, or whether you think you can’t, you’re right!” The idea here being, whatever you tell yourself you can and can’t do, it acts as instructions for your brain, which will then go about finding reasons why you can or can’t do the thing.

Thus, it’s always better to tell yourself, “I CAN do it!” If ever you’ve got something to do, and you don’t want to do it – or you don’t think you can do it – repeat to yourself out loud, “I can do it! I can do it! I can do it!” By giving yourself these positive instructions, your brain will start looking for ways to accomplish what you want to accomplish, rather than finding creative excuses for not doing the thing in the first place.

My own personal example from today, as I said, I woke up and my brain was all like, “Bleeah, it’s Saturday! Let’s forget about goals and just play videogames all day.” But then, because I’ve trained myself to recognize when my brain is trying to talk me outta stuff, I said, “Hell no! I’m going to do my goals! I’m going to say my positive goal statements! And I’m going to go to the gym!!”

Sure enough, even though I’m sore from yesterday’s workout, after I finish my writing, I’m going to have a health shake and then head on over to the gym.

Best of all, I’ll still have plenty of time to play video games later on! But instead of having the guilt of not going to the gym and not doing my goals, I’ll be able to play my games guilt free, since I’ve already gotten so much accomplished today.

Of course, I’m going to accomplish a bunch today because I’ve got a daily To Do list. Which gives me a great idea for tomorrow’s blog post.

Finally, the last motivational saying I always write down when I’m doing my goals is, “Today is going to be a great day!” Again, whatever expectations you have for the day, your brain will look for information that agrees with your expectation. So if everyday, you expect to have a great day, then more often than not, you will.